On February 2nd, we visited the Paley Center for media, a digital museum. The Paley Center does workshops regarding some of the things they have collected, and we attended a workshop on how the media has depicted women over the years. In earlier clips, from the 1950s-60s, it was made very clear that the only accepted body type was thin, and girls would try and make themselves look fatter in order to make men stop liking them. In clips from the 70s-80s, even in fighting shows, women were dressed in revealing and impractical costumes, and barely moved in order to remain womanly. It was overall a theme throughout these clips that the women were oversexualized and looked down upon by the men around them. The portrayals of these women was also very stereotypical. In a clip from pretty little liars, which aired in the 2010s, two girls talked about their friend who had died, but quickly switched to talking about their new hot male teacher. These clips were poor representations of women, and were just stereotypes of how women actually act. On the bright side, the more recent clips did show better representations of women, who were strong and depicted in a positive way, which shows that representation has gotten better over time. One of the more recent clips was an advertisement for an Always ad, and it showed boys being told to do things “like a girl.” The boys tried to follow the directions in a more girly, weak-looking way, but when the girls were told to do things like a girl, they did things in a normal way that wasn’t overly weak or “girly.” It was nice to see a general picture of the way the representation of women has progressed and how it has gotten at least a bit better.

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For a very long time, the makeup industry operated in a specific manner. Large posters showing thin women with flawless hair and faces and overtly feminine products promising to make you appear like them if you use their goods. Milk Makeup, however, is trying to change this. We spoke with Tyler Smart, the chief creative officer, and Kate Ingram, the director of creative operations. They explained to us how the community served as the foundation for their business and how they still uphold it as a core value. We also heard about the process of choosing models for product advertisements and how weight and race aren’t factors in the selection process. It was intriguing to learn about what happens behind the scenes of the advertisements that we see every day.
The way Tyler and Kate described the way they worked was honestly very refreshing. They described their models as “real people,” rather than the standard thin, white model shown so often in today’s society. They also described their products not as something to change your face structure or “fix” the way you look, but rather smaller things to enhance the face you were born with. It was nice to see a brand focused on the people and community rather than just profits. Overall, it was a really interesting experience and I learned a lot. It was great to see people actually being represented, people that look like the average citizen instead of someone who has devoted their entire career to looking perfect at all times. I think this interview gave our group a lot of insight into the behind-the-scenes aspect of the makeup industry and how Milk Makeup is working to change it.

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We interviewed Elizabet Altunkara, the director of education at NEDA, the national eating disorders association. NEDA is an organization that primarily helps people with eating disorders seek help and treatment. They have helplines on their website for people who are struggling with disordered eating. We decided to interview NEDA about the effects of seeing unrealistic standards of bodies and appearance on social media.

In this interview, we learned that when girls start to see unrealistic images and standards on the internet, in advertising, practically anywhere, they can start to feel dissatisfied with their bodies. Body dissatisfaction can cause girls to want to go on diets or start working out, and since this unrealistic content is being pushed towards girls who are young and impressionable, these girls can start going on more and more extreme diets and feeling worse about themselves, so much that they can start to develop an eating disorder. Eating disorders are incredibly deadly, and can result in permanent health and self-esteem issues. Overall, this was a very informative interview and we gained useful information from it.

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We decided to interview Natalia Petrzela. She is an author, activist, and fitness expert. We heard about her through our teachers and learned about what she does through her book on the pros and cons of the fitness industry, along with the articles she has written about beauty standards and the fitness industry. She has been in the fitness industry for a while and knows all about the unrealistic standards and socioeconomic divide that goes along with it.

We interviewed Natalia about how the fitness industry’s effects on women and girls, and how it can be quite toxic, along with how she thinks this issue has progressed over time. She told us that although she thinks the issue of the fitness industry and it being toxic (ex. Making comments about how women have been “bad” just by eating or forcing women to pay large amounts of money for a class that doesn’t do much) has gotten better over time, but it is still not great. She also referred us to some other people and organizations we could possible volunteer at in the future, which was really useful. We also read her articles, which also gave us some useful information. One of her articles was about the toxicity of an idea of a “beach body” and how it restricts women and has negative effects on their body image and self esteem. Overall, it was a very useful interview and we learned a lot, it will really help us when we put together our teach-in.

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